embracedbias wrote:I'm not making an abstract historical argument. I'm making a very specific psychological argument and applying it to human history.

I'm not sure what exactly qualifies as scientism here, but feel free to use that as a cloak to guard against too much empiricism.

I couldn't agree more. Macro claims tend to prove very weak at the micro level in history... which tends to prove very weak at the micro level of psychology. The difficulty with your argument is that you want to make specific claims about how decisions are made but have absolutely no knowledge of how humans make decisions.

Your entire position is scientism. And your entire argument is an abstraction. Foreign policy is not enacted by faceless individuals (note how your psychological arguments do not interface with actual agents). That Is the definition of a theoretical, abstract argument.

The final paragraph summarizes the breathtaking arrogance of scientism. I've read the primary documents outlining the sausage getting made. I suspect you havent. As said, your entire argument is a priori reasoning with a very shallow understanding of the actual subject matter.

embracedbias wrote:so the ideology was sourced by fear which was sourced by ideology?

... they held a capitalist world view, and believed (not entirely incorrectly) that the Soviet Union intended to bring down that system.

It isn't terribly difficult, but it requires some empathy and an effort to understand the "why" question, as opposed to focusing only on the "what." Basically, unlike your approach, not asumming you know the answer before looking at the agents.

embracedbias wrote:Psychological arguments don't have to interface with actual agents. Was the agent a human? Is there reason to believe that they have a fundamentally different cognitive structure than all the other humans that have participated in thousands of psychological studies?

You've read historical documents and used them to make specific empirical claims that rely on psychological mechanisms to which you have no knowledge (and actually seem to view as restrictive for some reason).

I have taken my understanding of psychology and applied to history in a broad sense (this does not require specific knowledge of this or that particular event because I am not making any particular claims about them). The only assumption is that the individuals involved in creating history were humans.

Where is the breathtaking ignorance?

So, studying psychology leads to expertise of all human activity ever, and no need to know anything else.

Where's the breathtaking ignorance? Read this post and really consider just how arrogant you are.

embracedbias wrote:What answer? To reiterate, the agents are humans.. which means we know a great deal about the way they thought. We don't know specifically what they thought - that's history - but we know that they had the same cognitive architecture as you and I. This may be an assumption, but it is a very small one.

So all humans are the same?

That is not a small assumption. Experience matters not. Culture matters not. They have the same chemistry, therefore you know their soul.

embracedbias wrote:Woah woah woah. I never said anything about not needing to know anything else. That depends on what question you're interested in.

If you're talking about decisions made by humans it is worthwhile understanding how humans make decisions. That's it. Not scientism. Just logic.

Your entire shtick here is that you don't need to know a whole lot, because you already know the answer.

Your study of psychology makes you an expert in psychology. Full stop. Entirely possible you can provide insight to foreign policy based on that background. But you have to actually engage with the subject matter in a meaningful way before that will be possible.

Not assume that abstract psychological theories are directly applicable to specific individuals. That's the definition of scientism.

embracedbias wrote:You need to stop and think about the generality of the claims that i've been making.

That Nazi Germany and the US approach foreign policy the same? You need to stop and think about how weak your general arguments are because you don't actually know what you are talking about. Does a nomadic tribe really use military power for the same reasons a nation state does?

And you are just plain wrong that our understandings of psychological mechanisms aren't applicable to specific individuals. That is simply absurd. And it isn't scientism (not sure what you think that is).

They absolutely can be, but you have to go and empirically prove that. Just saying, "we know X about people, therefore it is applicable to person Y" is a shit argument, and I bet you know that.

I could just as easily say that your abstract historical narratives are not directly applicable to specific individuals. I wouldn't say that, though. I'm not ignorant. Nor do I fear the knowledge that arises from broader levels of analysis. (I even took a minor in history in my undergrad days)

Abstract historical narratives ARE NOT applicable to specific individuals. That's why historians who write on specific individuals work very hard to get empirical information relative to a specific individual. If they can't find that, then they cannot make convincing historical arguments.

To summarize for those who are still paying attention: jester believes that 1) the US engaged in the cold war outof legitimate concern for the wellbeing of non-US citizens and 2) history tells you more about an individual person than psychology.

History actually bothers to go and learn about those people, not treat them like meat sacks.

I get that they bullied her and were over the top but really that Brigitte panelist makes a good point among a bunch of bullshit (including her own). The peaceful majority are more often the losers, not the winners. How are all those dead peaceful Chinese men, women and children feeling after Tienanmen? How were the Libyans feeling before we intervened to save their bacon? How about the peaceful Syrians who were mowed down?

Or how about all the left-wing Liberals talking about 'rape culture'? You really think most men are rapists or is it more likely a small minority where most men are peaceful? How about when the far-left cries about racism and stereotypes of black men as aggressive - most black men are peaceful, law-abiding and taxpaying citizens.

"Most people being peaceful" is like saying most people didn't die of the Spanish Flu in 1918 (or the Plague in medieval times) or that the SARS epidemic wasn't an epidemic or that racial profiling isn't THAT big of an issue. The list goes on and on and on. The problem exists and needs addressing but we can't offend the Muslims so we won't talk or do anything about it ever. Edit: It's the same reason racism, race doesn't get talked about much. We don't want to offend people's sensibilities!

Dog wrote:Can't we all just agree with eb that the US acts in self interest in a manner that is more moral than previous superpowers (but this not because they are supermens but because that's the prevaling morality in our time and place).

Seems like a whole lot of discussion about nothing.

Yes eb, america fights for american interests and western values which they (we) see as superior to others.

This guy, John Schindler, is a fucking oaf and a half. He's obsessed with Edward Snowden and the KGB and wanting to arrest Greenwald. But he's also fucking unhinged and petty. Any time something negative about Snowden or Greenwald comes out, no matter how specious, he and a few other Neocons and people who think they live in a Tom Clancy novel all retweet it. "BREAKING: Greenwald was in league with Putin all along", "Snowden once read War and Peace - should've seen the warning signs that he'd become KGB Agent", etc. And he flipped his lid recently because somebody posted a tumblr with screenshots of things he'd said and said they were defaming him and he'd sue them - that is to say defaming him with his own words. And the Weird Twitter crew have been hounding him recently with "oh for sure man" to everything he says repeatedly until he spun out in a brief meltdown before collecting himself and blocking them.

Well, he sent a dick pic out, and it was ALL OVER twitter last night. And it might be the funniest thing ever.